The aforementioned transformations in the socio-cultural and the cultural system are generalisable beyond the particular experiences of asexual individuals. Some have suggested that the heterogeneity which manifests itself through the Internet precludes generalisation. For instance Gauntlett and Horsley (2004: 28) argue that the diversity of material available online means that it is “not possible to … Continue reading »
Filed under Social Media and Communicative Ecology …
An introduction to Margaret Archer’s hugely under-appreciated work on culture (cannibalisation of the unpublished chapter part 2)
The term ‘culture’ carries considerable intellectual baggage yet is rarely subject to extensive conceptual scrutiny. Our use of it is simultaneously everyday and abstract, concrete yet nebulous and, as a consequence, operationalizing it within the context of research necessitates a degree of specificity which it profoundly lacks when utilised within lay discourse. Therefore drawing on … Continue reading »
I’m cannibalising an unpublished book chapter and I can’t bring myself to just delete the bits that aren’t going in the new paper…
It has become widely accepted in lay and academic circles that the Internet and associated digital technologies are transforming the manner in which human beings interact with others and understand themselves. In her seminal work Turkle (1996) argues that such technologies are engendering profound cultural changes through the renegotiation of conceptual and experiential boundaries which … Continue reading »
Liberating Ourselves from the Filter Bubble
In this RSA talk the pioneering online campaigner Eli Pariser talks about a crucial and, as yet under-discussed, danger facing the the social media web: the expansion of filtering into every aspect of our online activity. Sites collect data on usage patterns, particularly our reactions to being presented with content and the action (e.g. ‘like’, ‘share’, … Continue reading »
Relationality, Social Media, Dissent and Protest
The abstract for a presentation I’m doing at the BSA Media Study Group in Leicester next Wednesday: In this presentation I draw on critical realist theory, particularly the work of Margaret Archer and Christian Smith, to offer a tentative framework through which to study the impact of social media upon social practices of protest and … Continue reading »
Mark Fisher on Communications and Late Capitalism
In this keynote from Virtual Futures, Mark Fisher, author of the stunning Capitalist Realism, talks about the role which innovations in communicative technology play in the unfolding of late capitalism. He talks about the growing ‘digital communicative malaise’ which can be observed in contemporary society while suggesting that there’s still to much reluctance to address this … Continue reading »
